“You may look at them,” said I, “for fifty years without being able to make out one. You should go to an evening school.”
“I am too old,” said he, “to do so now; if I did the children would laugh at me.”
“Never mind their laughing at you,” said I, “provided you learn to read; let them laugh who win!”
“You give good advice, mester,” said he; “I think I shall follow it.”
“Let me look at the paper,” said I.
He handed it to me. It was a Welsh paper, and full of dismal accounts from the seat of war.
“What news, mester?” said the waggoner.
“Nothing but bad,” said I; “the Russians are beating us and the French too.”
“If the Rusiaid beat us,” said the waggoner, “it is because the Francod are with us. We should have gone alone.”
“Perhaps you are right,” said I; “at any rate, we could not have fared worse than we are faring now.”